Need help restoring from external drive

First off, let me say that I am a computer moron.
Three months ago, my MacBookPro (purchased Nov 06) began blinking a folder with a question mark. I went to the Genius Bar and they fixed it using Disk Warrior. They suggested I get an external hard drive and upgrade to OS X. So I did.
Yesterday, I got the blinking folder with question mark again. Went to Genius Bar, they said Disk Warrior would now cost $100 and there was no guarantee that I would recover anything. This time they gave me a new hard drive. I told them that I would use my external hard drive to put pics, music and files back on. My new hard drive was not installed until the store closed so they handed me my computer and sent me on my way.
I thought that putting my pics and music back on would be easy...not so much. Any suggestions on what I should do?
Thanks!

Is the version of iPhoto a complete iLife vesrion different? E.g. - is the reinstalled version the one that came with the mac and you then bought iLife 08 and were running that?
In a pinch you can get at the original in the iPhoto library under "originals" and reimport them - I know you lose albums and the like but they are accessible without iPhoto. They are ordered by date and month in folders so they are likely to be qrouped reasonably sensible in those.

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Since you can no longer backup to disk, how to restore from external drive without losing all ratings and playlists

since you can no longer backup to disk, how to restore from external drive without losing all ratings and playlists?

My own opinion is that you should install the later appropriate version of Silverkeeper. That said, I would in fact recommend if you can wait a few days for an answer, that you email the La Cie Silverkeeper backup team via the email link on the site at http://www.lacie.com/silverkeeper/
They are careful to say they are not officially providing a backup service, but when I emailed them with a query regarding usage about a year ago after downloading Silverkeeper for myself, I got a reply within a couple of days that cleared up my question.

Restore from External Drive

A while back my HDD died and in the meantime I just connected an external drive and ran OS X from that. Now I have a new HDD installed in my iMac and I would like to restore everything from my external. How can I do this? I tried going to Disk Utility and making a disk image but it would not let me. What is the best way to restore?

don't make any disk images. first reformat the internal drive using disk utility. make sure the format is mac os extended journaled and the partition scheme is GUID if your mac is intel and APM it's PPC. your profile says G5 imac intel. there is no such creature. G5 means PPC. so find out what you really have and partition accordingly.
then use the restore tab in disk utility to restore your external drive to the internal. check the box to erase destination.

Need help restoring from a SilverKeeper .sparseimage file

Before upgrading a MacBook from Leopard to Snow Leopard I used SilverKeeper to backup the hard drive, sending the data to a .sparseimage file. I'm now trying to restore - or expand/extract - the .sparseimage file to an external hard drive so I can move my documents and files to the freshly-installed OS. I've tried creating a Restore Set in SilverKeeper, setting the Destination as the .sparseimage backup file and the Source as the external hard drive mount, but this operation just results in a copy of the .sparseimage file being created in a new folder on the external drive; the files saved in the original backup are not extracted to the external drive. I'm trying this process because even though mounting the .sparseimage backup in OSX will allow me to browse the file system, the files in the user folder are not visible (and they're not just hidden). And this despite the fact that the original backup operation completed successfully and created a sparseimage file of 122GB - the same size as the used space on the original drive. Any help getting the files back out of this .sparseimage file would be tremendous. Thanks!

Thanks for the thoughts, Kappy. I have contacted LaCie as well; just waiting to hear back. <fingers crossed> Since it doesn't directly bring LaCie any revenue, I figured it couldn't hurt to ask around here as well since I got it from Apple: http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/systemdiskutilities/silverkeeper.html
For some reason when you do a restore set with SilverKeeper the destination has to be the location of your (previous) backup, and the source has to be the location you want to send the restore to. Believe me, it doesn't make much sense to me either; I guess the idea is that you're sending a previous backup back to the source.
As I mentioned, I can mount the image and browse it in Finder, but I can't access the files I need. I did get an 'alias not found' message (or something like that) at one point but am not seeing that at the moment. As far as I know the file is not encrypted; at least I haven't been prompted for a key/password.
I didn't have access to a big enough spare drive at the time I was making this backup and so had to resort to creating an image file that I could send to a network share. I probably will pass on SilverKeeper in the future, but it seemed like a good bet at the time...
Message was edited by: swinebird04

How do I restore from external drive, with outdated back-up software?

I mistakenly kept using my LaCie external drive's Silver keeper softerware after upgrading my Mac OS. My SilverKeeper version is 1.1.2, which I now know is incompatible with my Mac 10.4.6. (Maybe that is why I got an error report when I
ran the Mac diagnostic disk on the LaCie.) In any event, after suffering a major crash (Kernal attack, and resulting reformat of the hard drive), I am wondering how to attempt a restore from the LaCie. Should I try it with the software that actually created the LaCie back up that I have; or should I reinstall the appropriate version of SilverKeeper first?
I have been plugging along with some CD back-ups of the LaCie, but this is quite frustrating since it has to be done manually. Is it possible to download an upgrade to the back-up disk directly? And if so, would this really help matters?
As you can see, I'm really a bit of an idiot about these matters; so any ANY help will be most appreciated.

My own opinion is that you should install the later appropriate version of Silverkeeper. That said, I would in fact recommend if you can wait a few days for an answer, that you email the La Cie Silverkeeper backup team via the email link on the site at http://www.lacie.com/silverkeeper/
They are careful to say they are not officially providing a backup service, but when I emailed them with a query regarding usage about a year ago after downloading Silverkeeper for myself, I got a reply within a couple of days that cleared up my question.

Need help repairing bootable external drive permissions

I, like some of the other posters I have read, have messed up the permissions on a bootable external drive.
I don't have direct access to my home computer right now so I set up an external bootable copy of my personal account, so I can basically run a copy of my own personal computer from anyone elses mac. And when I get back home I will be able to copy back across any new files.
The set up was working great till I realized that my external drive was completely readable, and writeable by anyone who turned it on as a peripheral disk while logged in on the main computer if the computer was booted up on it's own startup disk.
If my external was set as the startup disk, then my password and account kept everything secure.
So anyway, not really knowing what I was doing I, using the show info command, changed the group permission for the whole disk/volume from admin to my username. Now unfortunately I cannot startup using my external disk; the whole system goes straight to Kernal. And all my files are still totally assesible to any one logged in on the computer using its own start up disk.
Can you help me with the commands, to first repair the group permission so my disk is bootable again, then second so that I can prevent anyone with out my password access to any files on the disk?
Thanks alot!

Can you help me with the commands, to first repair the group permission so my disk is bootable again, then second so that I can prevent anyone with out my password access to any files on the disk?
On another machine, open the Disk Utility in the /Applications/Utilities/ folder, select your drive in the list of disks, and then click on the Repair Permissions button; other solutions are available if this doesn't work.
Your two goals are mutually exclusive; there is no way to restrict access to an entire disk to yourself while maintaining the ability of that disk to boot Mac OS X. Your home folder can be protected in this way by changing the permissions on the item inside /Users/ with the house icon, or by turning on FileVault in the Security pane of System Preferences.
(11310)

Need help restoring HDTC610XK3B1 usb drive to original factory condition

A program on my computer, unknown to me, reformatted my drive. I lost all of my personal files thanks to this, and using a recovery program, Recuva to be exact, did nothing for me. I do not know any other options that wont cost me anything, so I am giving up.
I reformatted the drive back to NTFS and ran into two problems. First of all, the drive will not show up in file explorer, however it does show up in device manager. Second, I cannot find any way to restore the original factory installed files and software on the drive. How do I solve this problem, and is there a way to restore these original files back onto the drive?
Solved!
Go to Solution.

You don't tell which version of Windows you have access to.
I would remove all the partitions and data from the drive and repartition/reformat it.
See DiskPart.
Maybe you want this software. (I wouldn't.)
Toshiba Portable USB Hard Drive Software Installer for Windows
-Jerry

Help Importing from External Drive

i store all my music on my external drive and when i open itunes and select preferences. click advanced, then general ... then to select my drive i choose my EXTERNAL... then all is well! all my music goes into itunes and everything is great.
however, when i remove the external by ejecting it, then put it back in, itunes still plays the music but my itunes music folder location is not external...
how can i make it so that it's always my external?

Never open or run iTunes when the external is not connected and mounted. If iTunes runs and can not find the drive it defaults back to the internal drive location.
Patrick

Need help restoring from backup

My hard drive had a S.M.A.R.T. failure and I needed to back everything up by copying to another drive.
Having replaced the hard drive, I am now trying to restore all my settings.
Can I copy files to the new drive so that I can continue to iSync my SE P910i without having to do a First Sync again?
I have about one month's data on the phone that is not synchronised and therefore not backed up. I am concerned that a First Sync with "Merge data on computer and device" option selected will result in duplicate entries, and I cannot select "Erase data on device then sync" as I would lose this last month's un-synced data.
I have tried copying the P910i.phone from User/Library/Phones, as well as com.apple.isync.plist from User/Library/Preferences but when I launch iSync it recognised the P910i but still thinks that it is going to do a First Sync.
Thanks in advance!

Look at the options presented here:
http://pondini.org/OSX/Setup.html
Ciao.

Need help reformatting an external drive

*http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=2311807&tstart=0*
I have been up all night trying to figure out how to help myself - with no success. I posted a question earlier (see above) but didn't give it a useful title, so I'm trying again in hopes of attracting more readers and some tips. The details of my dilemma are explained in detail at the above http address.

Hi sauble
OK you set the Format to Mac OS Extended (Journaled), but it sounds like you have not set the Partition Map Scheme to *GUID Partition Table* using the Partition Tab in Disk Utility when you Formatted the External HD.
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?path=Mac/10.5/en/9014.html
Note the Info from System Profiler for one of my Maxtor External HD's, it has two Partitions (Snow Leopard Clone and Tunes/Photos). But in order for one to Install or Clone the OS X onto it for booting, the Partition Map Type (scheme) must first be set to *GUID Partition Table.* <<<<<<----
*OneTouch III SBP-LUN:*
Capacity: 300.09 GB (300,090,728,448 bytes)
Removable Media: Yes
BSD Name: disk2
Partition Map Type: GPT (GUID Partition Table) <<<<<<----
S.M.A.R.T. status: Not Supported
Volumes:
*Snow Leopard Clone:*
Capacity: 180.51 GB (180,514,353,152 bytes)
Available: 45.81 GB (45,806,546,944 bytes)
Writable: Yes
File System: Journaled HFS+
BSD Name: disk2s2
Mount Point: /Volumes/Snow Leopard Clone
Tunes/Photos:
Capacity: 119.1 GB (119,098,183,680 bytes)
Available: 14.09 GB (14,087,548,928 bytes)
Writable: Yes
File System: Journaled HFS+
BSD Name: disk2s3
Mount Point: /Volumes/Tunes and Photos
Dennis

Need help exporting from lightroom 4 on my Macbook Air with an external hard drive.

After importing photos to my new Macbook Air (2014) from external drive, it made me reformat my external drive. After reformatting, I tried to export edited images back to my external drive and it says "photos missing or offline", even when external drive is connected. How do I get my edited images back onto my reformatted external drive?

Ok, so at least you haven't lost the images.
The catalog knows "about" the images but not where they currently are. You cannot import them again because they have already been cataloged.
If the images are on the external drive in the location you want, the the procedure to re-connect is as follows.
Select one of the thumbnails. It should have an "!" or "?" on it (upper right). Click whichever it is and you will be asked to Locate the file. Navigate to the file to re locate it and make sure the check box "Find nearby images" is checked.
Lightroom will now relink all the images.
Note:
I usually just import from my external hard drive and then export them back to the external hard drive when I finish editing them.
this is not a "correct" workflow when working with catalogs. The files remain on the external drive. The act of importing is only necessary once to catalog where the files are and to allow quick access to them via the Library. Editing them either in or outside of Lightroom via Photoshop does not require you to move the file.

How to full restore from external hard drive backup

I'm a new MAC user and got myself in a mess where i need to perform full backup restore from external hard drive. Last back via time machine to external drive was 2 days ago, so the data is there.
What are the MAC boot commands to get me to system restore options. And there any useful tips you can pass on.

http://www.macworld.com/article/1165784/how_to_restore_data_from_time_machine.ht ml

HT4859 I need help restore my old messages and pictures to my phone. I did a restore from my computer and my boyfriends stuff downloaded on my phone. How do I get my stuff back?

I need help restoring all of my pictures and infor to my phone. My ex boyfriend info started downloading on my phone and earsed all of my info

Mission accomplished. While waiting for your reply,. I found an article that mentioned a copy/paste of the following code from the old pref.js to the new pref.js:
user_pref("ldap_2.servers.OutlookExpressAddressBoo.position", 0);
user_pref("ldap_2.servers.OutlookExpressAddressBoo_1.description", "Outlook Express Address Book");
user_pref("ldap_2.servers.OutlookExpressAddressBoo_1.dirType", 2);
user_pref("ldap_2.servers.OutlookExpressAddressBoo_1.filename", "impab-1.mab");
user_pref("ldap_2.servers.OutlookExpressAddressBoo_2.description", "Outlook Express Address Book");
user_pref("ldap_2.servers.OutlookExpressAddressBoo_2.dirType", 2);
user_pref("ldap_2.servers.OutlookExpressAddressBoo_2.filename", "impab.mab");
That identified the impab.mab file, and now all my contacts are showing.
Here is a link to the article: http://nctritech.com/thunderbird_contact_groups.php
Case closed. Thanks everyone for all your help.
Ted

Can Disk Utility get SMART status from external drives?

I recently updated my backup plan with a NewerTech quad-interface dock and a WD Caviar Green hd. I'm using the FW800 interface to connect to my iMac (10.6.7) Everything works perfectly, as expected. I noticed, though, that Disk Utility cannot report the SMART status on the new WD drive. DU simply says "Not Supported" under SMART Status.
Is Disk Utility telling me that it doesn't read SMART status from external drives? Or is it telling me that the new drive doesn't support SMART (which I would find highly unusual)? And, if it's Disk Utility that can't read the status, are there any third-party apps that can report the SMART status on an external drive?
Thanks,
JimC

Unfortunately I cannot speak to the NewerTech enclosure, but in principle it appears to be possible to have SMART information displayed even for external drives if the enclosure's bridge controller chip allows it.
My experience:
I've used two MacPower Pleiades FW800/400/USB/eSATA enclosures for several years and I've now supplemented them with two additional inXtron enclosures. They all work as expected daisy-chained to the iMac.
The interesting thing is that the inXtron enclosures came with a CD with some software on it ("Smart AP") which is not available for download, notably a Dashboard Widget for displaying actual and maximum temperatures, total hours of operation, start/stop cycles, drive model and serial number.
This widget is complete garbage, though – it is a nauseating nightmare of extreme over-design at the expense of even basic usability:
http://www.inxtron.com/information-center/smart-ap-for-external-hard-drives
To make matters even worse, it can only display the above information for the first external drive connected.
BUT: This Widget internally calls a command line utility which does the actual parameter retrieval, and that one can be called from the terminal as well.
So after installing the software from CD and effectively discarding the Widget, I checked out the command line utility in the Terminal and found that this utility actually reported data about ALL my enclosures, both the inXtron and the MacPower ones (there seems to be firmware compatibility across these):
(The '$' is supposed to be Terminal's bash prompt – type in only the rest of the respective line.)
$ /Applications/MacpowerAP/GetSMART 1
29 50 13 8
53 67 645 15829
52 53 90 7105
51 52 18 13
Each line reports the following for one connected enclosure:
[temp] [maxtemp] [cycles] [hours]
The drives are reported first USB, then FireWire drives, each in the order of first connection / mounting.
$ /Applications/MacpowerAP/GetSMART 2
WD-WCA**************
WDC WD30EZRX-00MMMB0
5TE09***************
ST31000333AS-00MMMB0
5TE09***************
ST31000333AS-00MMMB0
WD-WMA**************
WDC WD30EZRS-00J99B0
Each drive gets two lines reported, first the drive's serial number ("***" blocking out my exact ones), then the drive model.
$ /Applications/MacpowerAP/GetSMART 3
29 50 13 8
WD-WCA**************
WDC WD30EZRX-00MMMB0
53 67 645 15829
5TE09***************
ST31000333AS-00MMMB0
52 53 90 7105
5TE09***************
ST31000333AS-00MMMB0
51 52 18 13
WD-WMA**************
WDC WD30EZRS-00J99B0
This combines both of the above.
$ /Applications/MacpowerAP/GetSMART 5
disk4
disk1
disk2
disk3
This reports the mounted disk names (referring not to the volume names but to the internal Unix names as in /dev/[drive]); Numbering is in connection / mounting order, the actual sequence is as always USB drives, then FireWire drives.
$ /Applications/MacpowerAP/GetSMART 6
USB
1394
1394
1394
This reports the connection interface for each drive in the same sequence as all other commands.
$ /Applications/MacpowerAP/GetSMART 7
MPT934DS1.20.0104.00
MPT934DS1.20.0104.00
This might report the firmware revision or something like that.
These are the commands I know about, and they apply only to the "Smart AP" software supplied with current inXtron enclosures, but it may be possible that other brands use it as well.
I have not been able to identify information about the self-test (early(?) failure warning), but it might be contained as well in the data reported above.
As always, your mileage may vary and you should never do such experiments without FIRST making sure you've got backups of your data and that such backup is not connected during experimentation!
Maybe this can help some people getting the information they need; And maybe there are similar capabilities with other enclosures. At the very least it demonstrates that with the proper firmware in the enclosures themselves and some software on the Mac it IS possible to get at least some of the SMART information from the drive in an external FireWire- or USB-connected enclosure.
None of that is fed into the system's "official" SMART mechanism, though, so no luck using standard mechanisms or applications for it. It's strictly a command-line affair (deservedly disregarding the mishappen Widget).
Good luck!

Need help getting from 10.5.8 to 10.6.

need help getting from 10.5.8 to 10.6. i know i'm late to the game!

If you are not sure of what you are doing,If you are worried about losing anything when doing a major systems upgrade/update,
Before embarking on a major OS upgrade, it would be wise, advisable and very prudent if you backup your current system to an external connected and Mac formatted Flash drive OR externally connected USB, Thunderbolt or FireWire 800, Mac formatted hard drive. Then, use either OS X Time Machine app to backup your entire system to the external drive OR purchase, install and use a data cloning app, like CarbonCopyCloner or SuperDuper, to make an exact and bootable copy (clone) of your entire Mac's internal hard drive. This step is really needed in case something goes wrong with the install of the new OS or you simply do not like the new OS, you have a very easy way/procedure to return your Mac to its former working state.
Older version of CarbonCopyCloner found here.
http://mac.filehorse.com/download-carbon-copy-cloner/2734/
Older versions of SuperDuper can be found on the SuperDuper Website and Homepage.
http://www.shirt-pocket.com/SuperDuper/SuperDuperDescription.html
Then, determine if your Mac meets ALL minimum system install requirements.
Mac OS X v10.6 Snow Leopard system requirements
Purchased Installer disc here.
http://store.apple.com/us/product/MC573Z/A/mac-os-x-106-snow-leopard
To install Snow Leopard for the first time, you must have a Mac with:
An Intel processor
An internal or external DVD drive, or DVD or CD Sharing
At least 1 GB of RAM (additional RAM is recommended)
A built-in display or a display connected to an Apple-supplied video card supported by your computer
At least 5 GB of disk space available, or 7 GB of disk space if you install the developer tools.
In addition, see this discussion for more relevant info that you may need if you have any other questions or issues.
Snow Leopard upgrade - keeps Photoshop?

Need help restoring from external drive

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